A great number of different techniques are available to preserve plant foods to provide a more enjoyable or healthier eating experience for humans or animals. The enhancement may include a variety of modification of plant food properties such as, for example, the enhancement or maintenance of flavour, texture, moisture, color, nutrition value and/or appearance.
Freezing has been unsuitable in cold chain management for a wide-range of plant foods. When thawed, these plant foods may loose texture as well as taste, and sometimes also loose water, which results in a food product far from the common notion of freshness. Certain fruits and vegetables having a high water content, wherein said water upon freezing creates crystalles, which later on when the plant material is thawed the plant material collapse. Structural damage occurs due to disruption of cells following the formation of ice crystals. Loss of color, texture and structural integrity are thus common on thawing. This result in an unsightly appearance of the freeze-thawed fruit and vegetables, detracting from its market value, and may also involve the loss of nutrients etc.
From the literature methods for the treatment of plant foods are known, for example the following.
EP0266141 discloses a method of minimising the texture instability of a food product which comprises impregnating the interstitial and/or intracellular spaces of the food with a gellable colloid solution using vacuum infusion or pressure injection. After infusion the gel is allowed to gel.
US2006110504 discloses a method of enhancing food properties by electroporating a food using electrical pulses. The pulses are high-voltage pulses, and the food contains cells that become permeable from the electroporation. The food is exposed to food agents, which diffuse into the food's cells of the food to enhance properties of the food, wherein the electric potential gradients in a food will be about 700 V/cm. The improvement concerns tenderness, taste, flavor and texture.
However, it is desirable to have an improved method for enhancing the properties of plant food, and also food products with enhanced properties.